Dragon Prince
by Reevee21
Summary: What's the story behind the Night Fury, the only dragon of its kind? What was Toothless' past? This book, dedicated to the Night Fury we all know and love, will investigate that. And maybe what went through his head when Hiccup shot that fatal net...
1. Royal Blood

**The Dragon Prince  
A How to Train Your Dragon Fanfiction**

_"__The unholy offspring of lightning and Death itself."  
_-The Dragon Manuel

**One  
Royal Blood**

The night was cool and the air was foggy, typical of most nights on the dragon's island.  
Barely visible through the mist was a hoard of dragons. Two-headed dragons called Zipplebacks with a catch in each head; giant dragons with fine sets of horns, known as Monstrous Nightmares, carrying sheep in their talons; wart-ridden fat ones called Gronkles with huge fish in their overlapping jaws.  
They were headed to this island. And as they swooped into it, dropping the majority of their catch into the steaming pit of the queen, they hoped they had brought enough.  
One of these dragons, a Nadder, flew with several smaller fish in her mouth to a rocky outlook of the pit. This was her nest.  
Her chicks, of green and purple and one light blue one like herself, jumped and roared for her in their squeaky tones.  
"Ma, why were you out so late?" one asked. It was a purple one with small spikes rippling in ivory shades. This one they called Ripple.  
"I needed to get an extra catch for the queen," their mother answered, laying down most of the fish but keeping a few to eat herself.  
"Why can't she just fly away and get it herself?" Ripple asked, swallowing a tuna whole.  
"Yea, all she does is hide in that pit," the blue one growled. It would come by the name of Stormfly. "Keep your manners!" their mother gasped. "We do it so that she won't eat us. She's much bigger than you or I."  
"How big?" Ripple asked.  
"Big enough to take an entire whale and swallow it whole," their mom said, laying down and resting her chin on the edge.  
"Then why does she have such a small egg?" Stormfly asked, folding down her wings next to her.  
"I don't know: they say the father was a Skrill," she said, yawning.  
The egg in question was the Dragon Prince. It was the Queen's only egg. It lied in an indent inside of the mountain, kept warm by the rising steam. The rocks left an opening in the top to see the egg. It was night-black with a Navy Blue glint, like its Skrill father.  
"When that thing hatches, it'll be as awful-looking as its butt-ugly mother," the Nadder growled.  
No one wanted to admit it. The Queen was truly ugly. No one really knew if she had ran into the mountain when she was young or what, but she even had three eyes.  
And the only human to have ever visited (he hadn't even come out alive) had called her the Red Death.

Meanwhile, across the pit, was a Monstrous Nightmare's nest.  
She had two chicks, one sunset purple and the other magma red.  
She was right next to the Dragon Prince's nest, and took high esteem in being the egg's neighbor. Their hatchlings could play so well together…if they didn't die of the sight of that prince first.  
The line of the queen had come uninterrupted, and this was the first male. No one knew what happened to the father-he flew into the iced part of the land they knew and hadn't returned.  
That made the Queen eat one of her own subjects, the Tiny Terror that bore the news.  
In the week that had followed that dreadful bite, the Tiny Terrors grew in resentment of their queen. And so, afraid they might pull something drastic, this Monstrous Nightmare had been put in charge of it as well as a few others of her kind-  
and in memory of her husband, a Skrill.  
The Skrill, named Flashzap, rested in the chamber itself. The chamber was smoothed inside, the egg resting in a small bed of whatever plant material they could scrape off the blackened rock.  
The Nightmare herself was called Sunroar. She was an orange color that faded to red at her edges. Her red chick would be called Hookfang, her purple one Adderfang.  
It was her turn to keep watch tonight, so watch she did.

**Well, that went well.  
in case you didn't notice, this story will be about the time before and during Toothless' childhood. Meatlug, Barf and Belch, and Warnado will come in later, so HOLD ON TO YO' AXES!**


	2. Lightning

**Two  
Lightning**

Flashzap stirred at the sound of tiny squeaks. He opened one cloudy eye-  
and shot up, seeing the egg was gone. There, multiple Tiny Terrors were snickering at the entrance, a particularly large one holding the Dragon Prince's egg.  
"THIEVES!" Flashzap roared, charging at them.  
His call echoed through the mountain, stirring everyone.  
A fight broke out, the Terror swarm attacking and holding back the Nightmare guards and himself while a group of five flew out with the egg.  
The mother Nadder from earlier lifted her head drowsily and saw the flock leaving.  
"Not on my watch!" she bellowed, charging after them.  
Her hatchlings jumped away when she took off.  
"What is she doing?!" Ripple squeaked.  
"Getting the egg! The Tiny Terror groups took it!" Stormfly squawked back.  
Sunroar had gotten free and was flapping right behind her as the stealers landed on a large platform outside. It was on top of one of the sea spires, and pebbles dropped into the sea when the two parents landed.  
Now, ten terrors were on it, not counting the one wrapped around the egg.  
"Little pests!" the Nadder roared, slashing one's gut open and torching another.  
The target skittered away and aimed a blow to the face, fresh blood dribbling into her jaw.  
Sunroar slashed and spat the signature lava-like flame at the traitorous dragons. It was her watch, and she had fallen asleep!

Bach in the cave, Flashzap was shooting them down with his lightning, into the Queen's pit.  
He didn't care about the carcass.  
He didn't care about how many dragons he was killing.  
That was his guard they infiltrated.  
Adderfang and Hookfang were watching from afar, still too young to fight.  
"Why are you fighting?!" Adderfang asked the Tiny Terrors.  
They didn't answer, but one got dangerously close to the nest.  
"We need to get out of here," Hookfang growled, "or they'll get at us."  
Nightmares have enormous talons, even at youth. So it wasn't too hard for them to claw their way out of the rocky nest just as Flashzap crashed into the side.  
He was clawing them away as they bore closer and closer to his fast-beating, cold-blooded heart.  
And finally, one of them rushed to his chest and dug deep with its claws.

A Zippleback's nest was below Sunroar's.  
One of the hatchlings awoke to the strange feeling of a scarlet, warm liquid dribbling onto one of their noses.  
"There's something on my nose," the head whispered to the other head.  
"So what?" it muttered back. "Shake it off."  
"But it's red," the first head whined, "and warm and sticky-"  
"warm and sticky?" the second asked, looking over. "You stupid! That's blood!"  
The head shrieked and shaked it off.  
They heard multiple squeaks and cries of victory overhead.  
"Let's go and look," the head which had blood said.  
"Fine," the second muttered flying up.  
Zippleback's heads are two separate personalities. When they want to get somewhere, they just agree together on where to move and do so without thinking overly about it.  
This particular Zippleback would be called Barf and Belch.

If you can remember anything as a child, you'd remember you're disliking of blood. Well, I'm sure you can imagine Barf and Belch's horror when they saw a Skrill speared on the rock in front of them, blood pouring down and eyes dark and lifeless.  
Several terrors were around it, snickering.  
"Oh my gosh," Belch, the second head, whispered.  
The Tiny Terrors noticed them and took after them.  
The young Zippleback shrieked in unison and flew quickly out, unknowingly toward the same exit as Sunroar and the mother Nadder.

"This is our revenge!" one Terror roared before being toasted with the Nadder's breath.  
"Take it elsewhere!" the Nadder yelled back, decapitating another.  
Wave after wave of them had attacked. Each wave dispatched and disposed of with fire, claw, and tooth. Sunroar was tiring. Her actions slowed, just long enough for them to take a stab or two to her chest and neck. Blood poured from her wounds and she was starting to loose.  
So, in one swift motion, she squashed the Tiny Terror holding the egg and flung the egg onto the island, hoping someone would get it.  
Some_thing_ did.  
Lightning.

**Cliffhangers. Readers hate 'em, writers love 'em, and the book itself probably doesn't care because it's a work of fiction.**


	3. Night's Fury

**Three  
Night's Fury**

No one truly knew where the lightning bolt came from.  
A brief thunderstorm?  
Flashzap's final blast?  
Thor's blessing?  
A gift from the egg's father?  
The bolt came down and struck the egg just as Barf and Belch escaped the Terrors by hiding on the beach, when Stormfly, Ripple, Hookfang, and Adderfang had come to investigate the Zippleback's cry, and when Sunroar breathed her final breath.  
And in this climatic moment of terror, sorrow, and excitement, a dragon was born.

Lightning is very hot. The air around it alone is five times hotter than a Fireworm's skin.  
That being, the eggshell melted away and the dragonet thudded lightly on the crater made in the beach. It shook its head, clearing its thoughts and the boom of thunder in the air.  
The bolt had made the fog thicken with dust, so it was even harder to see.  
The hatchling stood up on four legs, folded in its wings, and looked around. Its head was easy to move, so it got a good view of its place.  
Something was wrong. The place needed to be…louder.  
Outside the rim, the five hatchlings that had gotten out couldn't see inside the crater.  
"We should go in," Ripple suggested.  
"In there? Nooooo-thank-you!" Adderfang squawked.  
"Chickens," Stormfly snorted, sliding down the black pebbles to investigate.  
Hookfang shrugged and climbed down with her.  
The so-called Dragon Prince heard something behind him. His two ear flaps cocked upwards and he walked to investigate.

Stormfly and Hookfang finally got close enough to see something.  
It was a little dragon, younger than them by days. It had night-black scales that shone navy blue in the moonlight, huge wings folded in loosely, a tail with two flaps, and flaps instead of horns. Its nose was well blended and triangular, it walked on all fours, and its eyes were emerald green with twisted brown. It had the most penetrable gaze: almost like…like a cat.  
"What are you doing out here?" Stormfly asked. "You're too young to be out on your own."  
"Aren't you too young, too?" the dragon asked, stepping closer.  
"I guess," Stormfly mumbled.  
"We flew out of the mountain, what about you?" Hookfang asked.  
"What mountain?" the black hatchling asked, cocking its head.  
"'what mountain?' the only mountain, genius!" Belch growled as the Zippleback walked in.  
The dragon looked to them and cocked its head the other way, then back again, like a confused bird. It squinted its eyes, trying to figure out why this dragon had two heads.  
"Speaking of which, could we get back to it now?" Adderfang whined from the rim.  
"Okay," Stormfly sighed. "C'mon; you shouldn't be out here like us."  
"Oh," the dragon said, following them.  
Hookfang could climb out, Barf and Belch could fly out, but Stormfly had a bit of trouble. When she had finally scrambled out, the black hatchling was still at the bottom.  
"Well, come on!" Hookfang said.  
The dragon walked a little ways away, took a running start, and glided out of the pit. It crashed into the ground, unexperienced with flight.  
Barf snorted.  
"You try getting out with giant wings," it muttered, picking itself up.  
Just then, the mother Nadder caught sight of them and flew down. Her landing caused the little black dragon to yelp and hide behind Adderfang.  
"What the-why are you out?!" it asked.  
"That Zippleback-"Ripple explained, pointing to Barf and Belch, "-was flying out with Tiny Terrors after it, and we followed. Then we found him." She nodded to the wide-eyed dragonet.  
"You're that guard's hatchlings, aren't you?" the Nadder sighed.  
"Yes, why?" Adderfang asked, stepping away from the black dragon.  
"I'm sorry to say this," she sighed, "but your mother has been killed."

The Nadder carried the chicks into the mountain on her back. The unknown hatchling looked over her horns, enjoying the sight, while the two Monstrous Nightmare orphans tried to figure out where they would stay now.  
Who would feed them, for Odin's sake?!  
"What is this place?" the black hatchling asked.  
"Boy, you really are dumb," Barf sighed. "This is the Dragon's Nest."  
"Wow," it gapped, "it's huge!"  
"Where do you come from, little one?" their ride asked, dropping off her chicks at her own nest.  
"I don't know," it hummed. "I found myself outside, in that crater, no one was around and something was squawking on that small, thin mountain over there..."  
"That's a Sea Spire," Hookfang whispered.  
"You don't say?" the mother Nadder stopped in midflight. "Tell me, did you see a big flash when you hatched?"  
"Yea," the dragonet answered, "it was hot, it was loud, and it was bright."  
"I wonder..." the Nadder hummed.


	4. The Queen

**Four  
The Queen**

The place around the Dragon Prince's nest was a mess.  
Red hot, magma-like blood of the gallant Nightmares who fought was draped around the place like tinsel on your Christmas tree. Flashzap's body had been speared on a sharp rock above the Zippleback's lower nests, scaring off nearly everyone. The nest itself was burnt with electricity and stained chrisom.  
The mother nadder passed on the unknown chick to the lone survivor of the attack, a yellow-red Monstrous Nightmare with black stripes.  
"I found this one near the spot where the egg was killed," she informed, "but it doesn't look anything like her…"  
The Nightmare nodded grimly and headed into the pit, regret and horror filling its stomach like the red fog around it.  
Few dragons even came out of here alive, much less one fresh from battle and a defenseless, odd hatchling.  
The rocks around were chipped, rough, and sharp after hits and clawing. As mentioned before, it was nearly impossible to see with the draping, red cloud around. Not an ounce of blood was even near, swallowed up by the hungry queen.  
The guard kept the chick balanced on its back, the ever-curious thing gripping onto his spines and looking around with wide, green eyes. He finally landed at the very bottom of the pit, which was smooth and black. His talons clicked a little noisily on the stone as he walked toward what he assumed was the queen.  
Until then, he had never seen such a bea-  
uh, dragon.  
Yea, dragon.  
She was curled in a motionless lump in the center until he cleared his throat. Embers fell around him as she unveiled herself.  
Boy, was that thing UGLY.  
She was apparently sky blue at some point in time, but now charred and dulled to a pathetic blue. Her six eyes glared at him behind a chipped nose horn and in front of a frill. Her tail dragged itself out of the way, the bolder-like end crushing a small pile of (gulp) dragon bones.  
"What is it?" she growled, shaking the pillars nearby with just her voice.  
The dragonet yelped in surprise and was quickly shoved back with a tail flick.  
"Y-your majesty," he roared as loud as he could without faltering, "your egg was attacked by a swarm of Terrors."  
"Oh was it? I didn't notice until the racket and falling dragon bodies clued me in," she hissed sarcastically.  
"Y-your highness," the Nightmare noted how she would be royal AND tall as he continued, "they carried the egg away and wouldn't give it back. From report, its captor threw it off after being killed-"  
"thrown off what?" she pressed, scratching a whale's fluke out of her teeth.  
"Off…a sea spire, your highness. It was struck by lightning a-and only this dragonet was found at the scene."  
He quickly dragged the escaping dragon back with his tail again, shoving it in front of the queen.  
The queen bent down to examine it, her hot breath blowing back the black dragon's head flaps.  
Was this what it was like before being eaten? Hot breath baking you, maw inches from your face, panic and confusion in your head as you waited, waited for it to come and-  
"What. Is. This thing," she asked, annoyed.  
"We have no idea, your majesty," the Nightmare answered.  
"It could be a hatchling of mine," she hummed, vibrating the dragonet's skull, "it's been so long I forgot what one looks like. If we don't know what it is, keep it around until it grows up a bit."  
"Y-yes, your majesty," the newly appointed guard nodded quickly, waiting for a chance to get out of this smoking death pit.  
The queen sat back down, falling onto her side and causing a small earthquake above.  
The nightmare snatched up the dragonet in his jaws carefully and flew away as fast as his wings could take him.  
"Who was that?" the hatchling asked when they were out of range.  
"That is the queen," he answered through clenched jaws, "if you don't listen to her or bring enough food, she'll eat you." The dragonet shuddered at the thought.

The dragonet, whom was simply called the Prince because of his origin, was kept in his supposedly old nest and guarded from anyone who dared to get close.  
It wasn't enough for his curiosity, heck, he knew every inch of the cavern he was in by heart. The other dragonets were also ever-curious about him.  
"Where did he come from?"  
"Why is his head so funny-shaped?"  
"When does he grow up?"  
"What's for dinner?"  
Okay, so maybe the last one wasn't directed at him. But, unhappy with his current area, he crept past the Monstrous Nightmare guard one night and crawled out of the nest.

'


End file.
